This invention relates to a shelving system for displaying and dispensing products for sale in a self-service retail environment. It is particularly adapted for facilitating the rear-loading of such shelving systems.
Rotating retail store inventory on a first-in, first-out basis is always desirable, and is especially important in the case of perishable foodstuffs. Rear loading of product onto retail store shelves is one way of achieving this goal: consumers withdraw product from the front, and delivery personnel re-stock from the rear.
Large grocery stores must stock a wide range of items to attract a diverse customer base. Unfortunately, not all of the items that a store stocks in order to maintain customer loyalty sell at the same turnover rate. Some items are slow-selling compared to others, but still must be stocked in order to attract a broad spectrum of repeat customers to the store.
Rear loading makes it easier to stock and display such slower-selling items. Although it is desirable to carry less inventory of slower-selling items, a retailer stocking a front-loading shelf with such items usually fills the entire depth of the shelf in order to achieve a uniform appearance and an aligned front row of products. Accordingly, the retailer has to order and stock more inventory of these items than necessary, which, when considered in the context of the entire store, can be unnecessarily expensive. In contrast, rear loading makes it easier to stock and display just a few of the slow-selling items while still achieving a uniform and attractive front product row. This allows the retailer to order and stock a reduced inventory of such slow-selling items, resulting in significant savings. Also, with a rear-loading rack, it is possible to place a mark on the shelves indicating for stocking personnel the desired amount of inventory to be stocked on the shelves, so that the inventory can be carefully monitored and controlled.
Despite these and other advantages of rear loading, prior art display and dispensing shelves suffer from several drawbacks that make rear loading difficult or impossible. In some prior art systems, access to the shelves is available only from the front. (See U.S. Pat. No. 4,919,282 issued to Duff, and U.S. Pat. No. 5,611,442 issued to Howard.) Such systems do not facilitate first-in, first-out inventory rotation, because when inventory is replenished it is difficult to load newer product onto the shelves behind previously loaded older product.
Other systems enable rear-loading, but suffer from drawbacks that make such loading difficult, inefficient or impracticable. In some instances, the system can only be used under certain conditions. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,593,048 issued to Johnson provides a hinged rear wall for rear access to the shelves for re-stocking. But this arrangement requires a working area behind the shelf rack into which the rear wall can swing, a re-stocking clerk can stand, and trays or boxes of product to be shelved can be temporarily stored during the re-stocking process. Because a working area is required behind the shelving system, the shelving racks cannot be placed in a back-to-back configuration, which complicates the problem of store layout.
In other instance, it is difficult to maneuver the system in and out of the loading position. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,607,068, issued to Coretti, discloses racks having open rears and wheels permitting the racks to be moved for access to the open rear. Coretti""s rolling racks, however, do not provide a means for orderly movement of the racks for loading, or for subsequent re-alignment of the racks to form a uniform facade. Such re-alignment is considered critical to the aesthetic appearance of a retail store, and the all-important factor of consumer acceptance. Moreover, it is also important to provide for the orderly movement of the racks to facilitate quick and easy restocking by delivery personnel. When racks do not provide for such orderly movement, restocking can become cumbersome and time consuming, thereby defeating the purpose of providing a rear-loading rack.
It is therefore one object of the invention to provide a product display and dispensing system which enables rear-loading of product onto the shelves of the system to facilitate the desired first-in, first-out inventory rotation.
Another object of the invention is to provide a display system comprising a plurality of individual shelf racks that can be efficiently and easily rear-loaded.
A further objective of the present invention is to provide a display system comprising back-to-back rows of shelving that can be efficiently and easily rear-loaded.
An additional object is to facilitate the orderly movement and replacement of shelf racks when a plurality of racks of shelves are located adjacent to one another, so that the racks can be easily rear-loaded.
Another objective is to provide a display system comprising a plurality of individual racks where the racks can be easily positioned to form an attractive, uniform facade for displaying product.
Yet another objective is to provide a display system that can be installed on standard conventional gondola systems to achieve easy rear-loading.
These and other objects are achieved by a shelving system comprising a gondola display having two rows of rear-loading shelves arranged back-to-back. In one row of shelves, the shelves are hingedly attached to the gondola display, thereby allowing the shelves to be rotated away from the gondola. This exposes both the rear of the rotated shelves and the rear of the shelves located directly behind the rotated shelves, thereby allowing for easy rear-loading of product into both row of shelves at the same time.
Because the row of rotating shelves are hingedly attached to the gondola display, they can be placed back into their original display position within the row merely by rotating the shelves back in placexe2x80x94there is no need to realign the shelves after rear-loading them. Likewise, there is no need to realign the non-rotating row of shelves because they can be rear-loaded in their original display position.
The present invention can also be used to allow for easy rear-loading of conventional gondola displays having a fixed base or bases. In such instances, a row of rotating shelf units, each having a retractable support wheel, is attached to one side of the conventional gondola. When these units are in their display position and when first rotated away from the gondola, the wheel is in a retracted position so that it is in contact with and can be rolled along the top surface of the fixed base. As the unit is rotated away from the gondola display and into its loading position, the wheel will extend downwardly from the bottom of the unit so that the wheel contacts and moves along the ground surface. In this manner, the retractable wheel is always available to provide support for, and facilitate the rotating movement of, the rotating shelf unit.
In the preferred embodiment, the center panel of a conventional gondola is removed when the row of rotating shelf units is installed on the conventional gondola system. With this modification, rotating a shelf unit into its loading position also exposes the rear of the shelves located directly behind the rotating shelf, thereby allowing for easy rear-loading of both rows of shelves at the same time.